Random Thoughts and Observations

(Sorry...don't have internet at home so couldn't post last night.  I'm at the school right now, playing football with the boarders while one of the house mistresses goes and gets her hair connected.)

Today was great! = )  It was a Friday…which meant football (I skinned my knee pretty bad…and the way you treat a cut here is with rubbing alcohol - ouch! - and this stuff called injection violet.  It’s bright purple and it totally stains you fingers and nails…but you put it on the cut and apparently it’s supposed to dry out and heal the skin…so I’m excited to see it work = )…but it was just a good day overall, too = )  They had a sports festival for the lower primary kids (yesterday was the pre-school’s sports festival), so it was so fun to hear the screaming and cheering coming through my window all day = )  I watched them for awhile during a slow lull, and at the same time there was a group of JHS boys playing around because they were on break.  It’s hard to explain, but I like totally felt like I’d “found my kind” when a boy went after a loose ball with his feet, rather than his hands.  The boys who got the ball from him just started juggling it in a circle, and they could all do it.  I don’t know…I just always felt so strange when I’d be playing basketball or Frisbee and my first instinct would be to go for it with my foot.  But here it’s like that’s everyone’s instinct…and even the non-footballers are coordinated with their feet.  Anyways…so today one of my jobs was inputting the new students’ info - typing their names, birthdays, parents’ names and contact info, etc.  I was so surprised that amidst all of this “normal“ information it asked me to type the number of spouses!  Mandy told me polygamy’s not illegal here.  Just random reminders that I’m not in Kansas anymore…haha = )  Oh yeah…and correction from earlier…I also had to type in the languages the child speaks (it’s amazing how EVERYONE speaks multiple languages!).  Earlier…I wrote Tree for the name of the most well-known local language in Ghana…but it’s spelled Twi.

On my way home from school…these kids asked me to snap their picture…it’s amazing how exciting it is for them to have something as simple as their picture taken!  Then when I got home, Julius, Fiifi’s son (one of Mandy’s million family members…haha…a cousin I think, who bakes the bread for the school and transports the food and does other odds and end jobs), who’s probably about 6, asked me to help him with his homework (well…he was too shy…so Belinda, one of the cook’s, daughter asked me for him).  It was SO fun!  Gosh…I miss helping children learn, and seeing the excitement in their faces when they figure something out!  He had to come up with five words that had the ‘oa’ sound, the ‘oo’ sound, and the ‘ow’ sound.  It was so hard…because the words I was thinking were words that he didn’t know.  The first word that popped into my head for ‘oo’ was pool…but he didn’t know what one was.  The ‘oa’ sound was even harder!  I thought of ‘coat’, ‘boar’, ‘soar’, ‘boat’, ‘roam’…and either knew he wouldn’t know the word…or asked him and he didn’t know it.  But then I thought of goat = )…so I had him think of an animal he eats that has the ‘oa’ sound.

I had a hard time figuring out his age…because the class you’re in really doesn’t indicate age.  There’re kids graduating from high school at 19, 20, 21...so you have 16-year-olds in “8th grade.”  A lot of times kids that come from the village haven’t started school yet, or are behind, so are placed in the grade/class where they are performing, not where they’re age-mates are.  Mandy said a 14-year-old girl had to go to class 1...but she soon dropped out = (  And she said a 40-year-old man begged to be admitted to SHS (senior high school) form 1 (9th grade) because he wasn’t able to advance in his job since he didn’t complete high school.

And one other “you know you’re in Ghana when” story I wanted to share.  On our way to Elder Holland’s devotional, Nana Yaw asked me what things in Ghana drive me crazy.  I really couldn’t think of things…but I did mention that there’s no soap anywhere…haha = )  Anyways…I joined Mandy in telling him all of the good things about Ghana (I think he’s experiencing some culture shock because it’s been like 13 years since he lived here), like how warm and friendly and hospitable the people are.  But it was also brought up how bad the littering problem is.  On cue, a guy in the van next to us through something out the window.  Nana Yaw called over to him to take care of Ghana, or something, and the guy apologized!  So humble!  Then, on the way home, a car that was driving so stupidly almost caused an accident.  Anny got so mad, especially when we saw that the driver was on the phone.  He pulled next to her (there was only one “lane” mind you…haha) and yelled something about the way she was driving, and how she shouldn’t be on her phone.  Like five minutes later, she had found us in traffic and pulled up next to us, wanting clarification on what she had done that was wrong.  Again, so unlike America.  To want to pull up next to someone who’d been yelling at you.  Here it seems like people might get worked up easily…but they also cool down so easily, too, so she knew it wouldn’t be a scary thing to come talk to him.  And then again…so humble…coming and asking what she’d done wrong rather than being angry that someone had just yelled at her.

Oh yeah…and I woke up with these weird scratches on my hand.  When I mentioned it to Chuks and Mandy, they exchanged glances, and then Chuks told me that it’s believed here that they’re caused by the wild geckos.  A little freaky…haha = )

The kids who wanted me to take their picture on the side of the road = )